`House' preteens won't trash

review B

July 21, 2006|By MICHAEL SRAGOW | MICHAEL SRAGOW,SUN MOVIE CRITIC

A scrawny, earnest boy named DJ (Mitchel Musso) and his chunky, blustery pal Chowder (Sam Lerner), suffering comically from the onslaught of pubescence, brave the innards of a famished haunted house - it eats toys and people - with the help of a fetching girls-school whiz named Jenny (Spencer Locke) in Monster House. You could call this elaborate animated concoction a coming-of-age tale if coming-of-age meant spinning in place.

The movie's biggest selling-point for youngsters is the cutting-edge digital wizardry that transforms the voice actors' physical performances into nuanced cartoons and places them at the center of a digital frolic. (The actors spent 42 days on black-box soundstages wearing wired rigs called motion-capture suits, allowing computers to trace their every movement, gesture and expression.)